Sunday, April 13, 2014

Therapy Cat Tales: NW Pet and Companion Fair 2014

Tabby writes:

I'm tired!!! I was on an adventure yesterday and part of today! Mommy and I did a talk/demonstration at the NW Pet and Companion Fair. Well, Mommy did the talking and I sat on a chair and in my stroller and looked cute. Does that count? Everyone said it did.

We took a taxi over yesterday, but today Grandma drove us. Nice! I got to spend time with Grandma! The taxi was fun, too, but I took a nap most of that ride because I was in my carrier. When I ride with Grandma, I get to be on Mommy's lap, although still on harness and leash.

Yesterday, after we checked in, we went over to the stage to see where to check in there. We finally found the people and got everything situated, but there were doggies on stage before us so I didn't check the stage out beforehand. The doggies were demonstrating how to do clicker-training. They already knew how to do it, though. They were just showing off for the people. I didn't think they were very interesting, but some of the dogs in the audience were paying attention.

Just as we were getting ready to go on stage, a lady asked someone else if she was named Mommy's name. Mommy overheard her, and went to meet the lady. She turned out to be our friend from Catster, Michelle!

Michelle and her brother are Bitu's purrents, and our family has known Bitu's family on Catster for years now! It's always so nice to meet the people who belong to our online cat friends! Mommy Erin's sister, Anna, took this picture on Michelle's iPad. It was nice that Anna could come, too. We ate lunch with Anna after our presentation and walked around the expo with her for a while. She got her face painted like a cat, even! Mommy was going to get her face painted, too, but there was too long a line.

We also did the fashion show/costume contest. No, I didn't win anything, but that's fine. There were a lot of dogs participating, but I wasn't the only non-canine entrant! For once!!! There was a bird named Athena, who blogs on tumblr, and a pig named Periwinkle, who has a Facebook page. Athena and I didn't mind being right near each other! Here's a slideshow of some of the costumes from the contest.

After the fashion show, we went around to more booths. We got a huge bag of goodies from Pet Pros. Thank you so much for all the yummy-looking food and treats!!! Mommy had business cards made up for me, so she handed those out to the people we met and people who came to our presentations on both days. I met a lot of new friends! There were even people who want to know more about training their cats to be therapy cats like I am. Plus, a few places that want us to visit people!

If you are one of the people we met at this event, feel free to contact us using the "PDX pride" profile link near the top of the right column on this blog or the message feature on my Facebook page.

This morning, we did our presentation again. I was better about not sitting in my stroller the whole time. I sat on a chair at the back of the stage, so Mommy picked the chair up and put it front-and-center. Not what I had in mind, but that was ok for a while. Then, I decided I wanted my stroller, which was off-stage. I headed toward it, so Mommy picked that up and put me in it, then wheeled it to the middle of the stage and talked from behind it and the chair. Everyone thought that was funny, but I was comfortable and was showing off that I had a safe space that I was trained to be in. That was just fine with everyone!

The black cat that we saw last year was there again this year with her person. Guess what? Both of them want to be a feline-assisted therapy team, too! They are going to meet us on Wednesday for our regular visit to H. to see what we do, and hopefully will get registered to visit different places, too! Wouldn't that be cool? Maybe we can even open up a Portland, OR, chapter of Love on a Leash!

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About Us

One of our internet friends on HubPages gave us our nickname of "PDX pride". Mommy's "name" on there is KT pdx (her initials plus the airport code for Portland, Oregon, the closest airport to where we live). So, when we started hijacking her account to write hubs sometimes, someone there dubbed us the PDX pride, as in a pride of lions, because there's so many of us. The name stuck, and we think it definitely fits!